Saturday 24 February 2018

A children's treat day in Mafambisa



Today was our last day in Mafambisa. It was truly dedicated to the kids and making them all feel very loved and cared for. To start with, there were only about six kids so we threw a ball across a circle. When more of the children came we turned the game into volley ball. When the children got tired of this, we moved on to some parachute games like fruit salad. After that, we played more games with the children : follow me, duck duck goose and river dam. They all enjoyed this, especially because they laughed at us because we couldn’t speak Siswati.

Libby, Liz, Val and Rachel set up some finger painting for the younger children, they drew hearts and wrote their names. This allowed the children to communicate with us by expressing themselves through their masterpieces, despite the language barrier. Later on, we got the bubbles out and all the children loved blowing them and trying to pop them. Rachel then shared a Bible story through a game and then all the children recited the Lord’s prayer before running over to receive their sandwiches we had made for them the previous night. 


Soon after we had all finished eating, it was nearly time to say our goodbyes, so we all took photos and Millie had a very long hug with Lala (she didn’t want to let go). Mr Leonard had a polaroid, and all the children were very keen to have a photo taken together, and they all wanted to take a photo home with them. After another few minutes, Mr Leonard practically had to drag the students away from the children, as they had all grown attached to them. Once everyone was on the minibus, we set off, some of us getting very emotional as we waved the children goodbye. We had five minutes of quiet and reflective time, which was much needed. 

 

Finally we arrived back at the Hub, and had a debrief with Jen, who hosted our team. We each shared our worst and best moments from out trip so far, although the highlights outnumbered the negatives! We also discussed how we were planning on acting as advocates when we arrived home, and which stories had impacted us the most.   

Georgia & Millie

*Names have been changed. The views expressed in this blog post are those of the contributors and not Link for Life project or Hands at Work in Africa.